Description

Thomas Purves Marwick, 1899. 2-storey 3-bay Italian Renaissance bank and manager's flat with basement and canted entrance bay. Red polished ashlar. Side elevation squared and snecked rubble, ashlar margins.

S (GORGIE ROAD) ELEVATION: 2-storey 3-bay elevation with 4th entrance bay in chamfered angle to right. Principal openings architraved with scrolled keystones; 1st floor windows rectangular. Dividing cornice, moulded cill course to 1st floor and eaves entablature with ashlar parapet. Ionic columned doorcase to angle bay with round-headed architraved blind fanlight, scrolled consoles and cornice; 2-leaf panelled door. Window above. Ground floor windows arcaded with Tuscan columns. Square-headed half-basement openings with chamfered arrises now blocked. Each floor flanked by panelled pilasters, banded at ground.

E ELEVATION (TO ALLEY): 3-storey 4-bay and stair-tower. 2 S windows at 2nd storey (to office) roundheaded, others rectangular. 4th bay curved with bowed windows, abutted by D-plan stair tower with entrance at ground and 2 windows to N.

Timber sash and case plate windows, flat roof.

INTERIOR: banking hall and offices refitted. Flat above still with some decorative plasterwork.

Statement of Interest

Wallhead stack to right of entrance removed, along with wrought-iron grilles and basement windows, probably during stone cleaning of main facade. Balustraded balconette designed for entrance bay but may never have been executed. Built for the National Bank of Scotland. The former St Martin of Tours church once stood on the adjacent site, now occupied by ungainly flats, which explains the diminutive scale of the bank and its slightly awkward setting.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q56631042

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Pioneers of Modern Design: From William Morris to Walter Gropius (Penguin Art & Architecture)
• 
  [(Cumberland and Westmorland)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1967)
• 
  Herefordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Cornwall (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Surrey (The Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Sussex: East with Brighton and Hove (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)